So, you found my site. Welcome! Yes, this is my personal blog, where I write posts about my book series, and anything that interests me. I’ll provide news and updates about current and upcoming projects, along with other relevant information, such as appearances, announcements, and other details.
A little about myself… I’ve been a long-time reader of science fiction, fantasy, comic books, and manga since I was a wee tot in the distant 1980s. I spent my childhood and youth on a steady diet of Anne McCaffrey, Mercedes Lackey, Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, and David Weber. In my 20s, I discovered anime and manga, a love that had been kindled by Sailor Moon on YTV… the only thing we had that passed for a cartoon channel in rural Canada in the 90s. I have enjoyed such series as Dragon Ball (yeah… all of them, back to the original, even), Naruto, Bleach, Hunter X Hunter, Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure, Assassination Classroom, and many others.
From the age of 13 on, I was writing stories. Fortunately none of my early work survived 20+ years of hard drive failures and lost data… it was pretty typical for early work. The mechanics were shaky, the pretext naive, and every character was a Mary Sue. But I kept at it. I played around with fanfiction for a while, even writing several novel-length works, which greatly benefited from decades of reading professionally edited, published novels, and my own professional writing experience as a researcher for a local program evaluator. No, I won’t release my fanfiction author name… some lines shouldn’t be crossed. If you happen to find my work in the wild, I will neither confirm nor deny anything. However, all those years of practice with characterization, setting, plot, and flow helped to contribute to my craft. The result is my first full-length original fiction novel, Blackout, due to be published by the end of March, 2021. Blackout is the first novel of an anticipated 3-4 book series entitled The Sunrise Regiment. The second book, Midnight, is in the process of being drafted, as of early 2021, and is expected to release for March of 2022.
When I’m not writing, I can often be found reading (gotta keep up with the craft somehow!), playing such video game classics as Stardew Valley, Skyrim, and old Sierra adventure games, creating home gourmet cuisine for my beloved partner, knitting, and petting my cat, Mao. Mao is Cantonese for ‘cat’. Don’t look at me, my partner named her; Cantonese is her first language.
I’m a many-talented jack of all trades who has managed to master a few. I’ve been an educator, a researcher, and an administrator, lived on a farm, lived in a big city, been on northern construction sites in -40 weather, kept middle schoolers from sawing off their fingers in shop class, seen the Northern Lights (and heard them!), and been within a few thousand feet of an active volcano. I’ve seen a lot of life in my years on this earth. They say you should write what you know… most of my stories thread personal experience and things from my own life and the lives of my loved ones in a speculative fictional context. Anything I don’t know personally, I insist on researching. The believability of a speculative fiction story is all in the little details. Did you know a 2005 Dodge Grand Caravan can go 400 miles on a 20 gallon tank? I didn’t… until I researched it for Blackout. It’s the little things that turn a fictional world like Blackout into something a reader can believe.
Young writers, I know you’re out there. I know you’re out there because I was once a young writer too. There are two things I would tell an aspiring writer. The first is to keep writing. Every day, if you can. Get into the habit of writing a little every day, even if it’s just a paragraph or two. It doesn’t have to be fiction, it doesn’t even have to be shared. Just write something, besides texts or posts on your favourite social media platform. The second is that the mechanics matter. Give your readers the smoothest ride possible, and they’ll focus on the things you want them to focus on, like your characters and plot and story.
Christine Luft, Author 